The curious case of Jason Day

Jason Day is one of those guys that I have always enjoyed watching play golf. Starting in 2011 with his finishes at the Masters and US Open, it appeared Day (or JayDay, as I like to call him), was going to become a major player for many years. He almost broke through again at the US Open Merion in 2013, but Justin Rose prevailed through another Phil Mickelson collapse. It seemed as though JayDay would follow in the steps of Lee Westwood, Colin Montgomery and other great golfers that just couldn’t win a major. However, when he won his first WGC event in 2014 at the Accenture Match Play, it was just the springboard that he needed. Day went on an absolute TEAR in 2015, winning 5 tournaments, culminating in the 2015 PGA Championship at Whistling Straits. He continued his streak by winning two out of the first 3 FedEx Cup tournaments and finished the year 3rd in the FedEx Cup. If not for the screwy FexEx Cup point reset after the 3rd tournament, Day would have ran away with the playoffs and would have been sitting on a cool $10 million in the bank. Now the world’s number 1 golfer, It seemed as though JayDay and Jordan Spieth were destined to battle each other for years to come.

Day started off 2016 fantastically, with back-to-back wins at the Arnold Palmer and the WGC Match Play. In May, he lifted the coveted Player’s Championship trophy at TPC Sawgrass, and it seemed as though JayDay was destined to dominate for the year. He finished in the top 10 for 3 out of the 4 majors that year, including almost repeating at the PGA Championship at Baltusrol. Day went into the FedEx Cup playoffs cruising, but it would soon come to a crashing end. He withdrew from the final round of the BMW Championship and after the first round of the TOUR Championship with s back injury. JayDay has had a long-standing problem with his back, and having to withdraw from those two events really derailed what could have been a fantastic year for the then-28 year old.

Unfortunately for JayDay, his 2017 season (as shown above) has been a roller coaster of events. In tournaments like the Byron Nelson, he looked like his former self. But like every roller coaster, with every up, there is always a down. The 2017 US Open may have been the worst start of his career, and was then cut again over a month later at the Travellers in Hartford. Hes only played 3 tournaments since, but did make the cut and got a top 10 in the PGA last weekend.

So what’s the morale of the story here? Yes, it’s been a pretty down year for the JayDay we have come to expect. He’s easily going to make the FedEx Cup playoffs, and as we saw from his 2015 run, anything can happen once you make the top 125. I think this year has so far been one to forget, but JayDay has plenty of time to recover. Whether he does or not this year, be on the lookout for him to bounce back in a BIG way in 2018. Maybe we will finally see JayDay in a green jacket, or lifting the claret jug.